The Lahore Ahmadiyya Movement Blog

Vilification by label

Submitted by Abdul Momin 

Since being declared non-Muslim, in Pakistan it is fashionable to label someone as Qadiani or Ahmadi even if that person is not even aware of Ahmadi beliefs, in order to defame him. This can happen for any reason, e.g for the purpose of litigation in order to influence a court of law or it could be to prevent appointment of someone to a higher post in a government job. All it takes is for someone to have a present or past (deceased) relative who is or was an Ahmadi, and from time to time the label of being Ahmadi will be applied to that non-Ahmadi person. Such a person has to prove his being non-Ahmadi through constant denials during his lifetime. Were it not such a serious matter and the severe persecution that Ahmadis have faced, one would find this whole matter laughable.

But just as the label “Ahmadi” is used as a weapon to demonise and curse people in Pakistan, it seems that now the label “Muslim” is used by bigoted Christain Evangelists to demonize their opponents in US presidential politics. The ignorance or false propaganda of these Evangelists can only be matched by their anti-Ahmadiyya counterparts.

The leading US presidential candidate Barack Obama has to repeatedly deny that he ever was a Muslim:

“My grandfather, who was Kenyan, converted to Christianity, then converted to Islam,” Obama said Sunday. “My father never practiced; he was basically agnostic. So, other than my name and the fact that I lived in a populous Muslim country for four years when I was a child, I have very little connection to the Islamic religion.”

-A debunked chain e-mail circulating widely on the Internet suggests he is hiding his Islamic roots. It says he was sworn into the Senate on the Quran and turns his back on the flag during the Pledge of Allegiance. He took his Senate oath with his hand on a family Bible, and he says, “Whenever I’m in the United States Senate, I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. In fact, no candidate could survive if he publicly spurned the pledge.”

-Another false report says he attended a Muslim madrassa school as a child in Jakarta. Obama was born in Hawaii and moved to Indonesia when he was 6 to live with his mother and stepfather. He returned to Hawaii when he was 10 to live with his maternal grandparents.

(From Haaretz, a liberal Israeli newspaper)

Recently a picture of Obama surfaced wearing African tribal clothes, and that was reason enough for him to be labeled “Muslim”!!!